Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Cape Verde, a country 600 kms off the coast of West Africa,
and made up of 10 rocky islands has a population of just over half a million
souls. It was part of the Portuguese empire that linked Angola with Mozambique,
and Brazil with Goa and Timor. Chances
are you’ve never met anyone from the country unless you’ve spent time in
Portugal where people from all the old imperial holdings mix together in the
squares and bars of major cities. The
economy of Cape Verde is small and produces very little. 90% of the food Cape
Verdians eat is imported.

Cape Verde

When it comes to musical culture, however, Cape Verde is a
heavy hitter. Punching far above its weight, it has produced some of the most
popular singers and infectious styles of music that the mind boggles. Of course, best known in the West was the
late Cesaria Evora. But many jazz
icons (Horace Silver, Paul Gonsalves)
were expatriate Cape Verdians, as was the R&B group famous in the 70s and
80s, Tavares.

The national music of the country is a guitar based dance
music known as morna. Songs of love
and departure, longing and homesickness (so many have had to seek work far from
home) and songs of joy and great feeling. “A hymn of love, illusion and
melancholy” according to the poet Fausto
Duarte,morna is like a contagion.
Catch it once and you’ll have recurring (and very pleasurable) bouts regularly
thereafter.

Jorge Humberto

I’ve been listening to Jorge
Humberto’sAr de Nha Terra,
pretty much continuously for the past few days.
It is music that is impossible to dislike. Indeed, as soon as he starts
strumming the guitar you’ll feel as if you can smell the ocean and feel the
breeze blowing across your face.

A gifted singer with a warm, persuasive
voice, Jorge Humberto was born on
the 26th December 1959 on São Vicente in the port of Mindelo, the cosmopolitan
hub and cultural capital of the Cape Verde archipelago since the last century.
With a magical, instinctive, profound feel for words, the son of Mindelo has
developed a style whose poetic and musical vein is enriched by philosophical
musings. He began to write in 1975, the year of independence. The end of
colonisation was also an intellectual liberation, giving impetus to every
artistic genre. This creative effervescence also led to the appearance of many
groups who gave a new momentum to traditional music (mornas and coladeras) and
paid tribute to its African (batuque,
tabanka, etc.) and European (mazurka,
contredanse, etc.) roots. Jorge
Humberto joined this movement. In 1982, he began his public performances of
classical mornas and Coladeras on the guitar, with a
particular fondness for the works of the old poets, such as Eugénio Tavares and B. Leza, relatively in tune with his
sensibilities as a social commentator.

Sculpture in honor of Cape Verdian musiciansin Mindelo

After a work accident that affected his
fingers and forced him to play guitar in a different way, Jorge Humberto moved to Portugal. The depth and originality of his
lyrics make him a special figure on the Cape Verde musical scene. His
psychological observations, existential thoughts and metaphors, and taste for
social critique link him to the "Claridade" literary school founded
in the 1930s in Mindelo, whose key personalities were Baltasar Lopes and Jorge
Barbosa. The Creole language the artist employs (a language he says he
loves “like the food you eat”) enables him to achieve extreme precision of
expression and ensure a greater harmony of sound in his words and music.(http://www.lusafrica.com/4_1.cfm?p=50-artiste-world-music-cap-vert-label-lusafrica)

Really really nice music, this. Close
your eyes, turn it up and let your mind wander to the warm waters of the
Atlantic.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Going into Baghdad from Amman in 1991 after the first Bush
War took 14 hours by jeep across the desert.
For the first couple of hours we were allowed by the drivers to listen
to our tapes of Nina Simone and Leo Kottke. But the kindnesses ceased around midday. From
then on it was Iraqi pop music that sounded very much like tonight’s selection.

Hatem has enjoyed
a good career since the early 1990s and is popular across the Middle East. I
picked up this album in the duty free shops at Dubai airport several years ago.

Don’t know anything more about him but this is straight
ahead Arabic pop music which is always fun and lively.

Thursday, August 23, 2012

When he was born, Qamuruddin’s grandfather, muttered the
first prayer of the Quran, bismillah al
Rahman al Rahim (In the Name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful).
Henceforth, the child became known as Bismillah, and grew up to be the mighty Bismillah Khan, one of a handful of
absolute paragons of Hindustani classical music.

Bismillah Khan
grew up from a young age in the holy city of Varanasi in the eastern end of
Uttar Pradesh. His male family members had been musical servants of the minor
royal family of Dumraon in Bihar, all of them playing the Indian ‘oboe’ played
on all happy occasions, especially marriages and coronations. That the origins of the shenai (Indian oboe) have been traced to the pungi, blown by snake charmers all across northern India suggests
the ‘commonplace’ nature of the instrument. While it is an important part of
the Indian orchestra and plays an important role in the observance of many
public rituals, it was not until Bismillah
Khan, popularised the instrument beginning with a virtuoso performance at
the All India Music Conference in Calcutta in 1937, that it gained acceptance
as a classical instrument.

For eight decades Bismillah
Khan promoted the shenai across
the world, travelling frequently to the West as well as throughout Asia and
Africa. Unlike most maestro’s he rarely
took on students preferring to dedicate his energy to performance. Though a Shi’a Muslim, Bismillah Khan was a
passionate advocate of the unity of all peoples, and championed Hindu-Muslim
unity. As a non-Hindu he was ironically, associated with the grand Vishwanath
Temple in Varanasi into which it is forbidden non-Hindus step, often being
asked to play at festivals in the temple. Similarly, he was a devotee, like all
Indian musicians of the Hindu goddess, Saraswati,
the deity of arts, culture and learning.

I had the privilege of hearing him play in Lahore in 1986.
It was at the Alhambra Center, the city’s main cultural venue that he entranced
an audience, many of whom would have been born in India but had moved to
Pakistan in the intervening years. They were rapturous in their applause. I
remember thinking, as I watched him humbly accept the accolades, that he looked
more like a neighbourhood tailor than a grand Ustad of Hindustani music. He
seemed uncomfortable with the fuss being made over him and after a few
courteous and stiff bows, hurried from the stage.

This record is rather strange. From the late 60s, it seems
to be aimed at an audience who was a little unfamiliar with or put-off by
classical music. You can hear the
producers saying, ‘Bismillah ji, most
modern Indians these days want things small and short. So please don’t play any
long ragas.’

And so he did. A dozen short ‘summaries’ of some of
Hindustani music’s great ragas. A good way to be introduced to them and to
listen to their difference. And to appreciate the wizardy of the man called Bismillah.

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Imagine, if you will, the Republican Party wins the American
election in November. One of the first acts of President Mitt Romney is to ban
all rock ‘n roll bands, not to mention country, bluegrass, jazz, pop groups,
symphony orchestras and chamber orchestras.
In their place, his Vice President Ryan announces, the Republican Party
will set up ‘official’ bands in each community who are paid salaries and sing
songs that praise the Tea Party and other great national themes.

Impossible, you say? Let’s hope so. What sort of
excrutiating music would those bands produce? That is impossible to imagine.

But something like this happened a few decades ago in the
West African country of Guinea. The first President of independent Guinea,
Ahmed Sekou Toure, in 1958, disbanded the country’s many musical groups. In their place the government sponsored and
set up a raft of official music groups, with the aim of creating a national
consciousness among the people. Among
these groups was one band, Bembeya Jazz
National, which quickly became one of Africa’s most influential,
accomplished and well loved bands.

Bembeya Jazz,
also referred to as the Orchestre de
Beyla in the early days, started as the regional orchestra from the town of
Beyla in southern Guinea.
They were formed with the help of the local governor, Emile Kondé, to act as
the region’s "orchestre moderne". The initial line up included Sékou Camara and Achken Kaba in the brass section on trumpets, Sékou Diabaté on guitar who was the youngest member at the time, Hamidou Diaouné on bass and Mory "Mangala" Condé on
drums. Leo Sarkisian (who went on to
join the Africa Service of the Voice of America in 1963)
recorded Orchestre de Beyla in 1961
for the Hollywood based Tempo International label
(Tempo 7015). The band were just being formed in Beyla and according to Sarkisian, called themselves Orchestra Bembeya, after a local river.
The session also featured the female singer Jenne Camara as part of the band. The recording, one of ten Tempo
LPs featuring a variety of Guinean music recorded by Sarkisian, was not released commercially. All 10 LPs were pressed
in limited editions of 2,500 and released in 1962, but the majority of them
were sent to the Guinean government. Bembeya's
album was titled Sons nouveaux d'une
nation nouvelle. République de
Guinée. 2 Octobre 1962. 4ème anniversaire de l'independance nationale.
Orchestre de Beyla and included the songs Présentation, Yarabi, Lele, Din ye kassila, Wonkaha douba, Seneiro,
Wassoulou and Maniamba.

They became better known as Bembeya Jazz after the release of their first album and added
singers Aboubacar Demba Camara and Salifou Kaba to the band.

Specializing in modern arrangements of Manding classic tunes, Bembeya Jazz National won 1st prize at
two national arts festival's in 1964 and 1965 and were crowned "National
Orchestra" in 1966.

Initially an acoustic group, featuring a Latin-flavored horn
section of saxophone, trumpet, and clarinet, Bembeya Jazz National reached its apex with the addition of lead
singer Aboubacar Demba Camara. The
group toured widely, and became one of the mostwell-known groups in Africa.
Among their biggest hits were the songs "Mami Wata" and "Armee
Guineenne".(Wikipedia)

Bembeya Jazz National
and other official Guinean groups such as Balla
et ses Balladins went on to become the ‘shining light’ of a newly
decolonised continent. Their musicianship was intricate and exciting even if
the subjects of the many of the songs were superficially boring. The national
airline. The Guinean army. But there is absolutely nothing boring or
canned about this music. It is endlessly
creative, full of joyful verve (joie de vivre) and bags of fun. Just listen to the rousing live version of Super Tentemba and tell me you wouldn’t
want to have been there with a big bottle of beer in your hand, dancing the hot
night away.

Friday, August 17, 2012

Apparently in Thailand there is a proverb that says, if you
meet a Brahmin and a snake on the path, kill the Brahmin first.

Despite this rather crude sentiment, the cultural ties
between India and Thailand are ancient and deep. Indian merchants sailed all up and down the
coastlines of SE Asia selling silks and spreading the truth of the Vedas and
the Way of the Buddha. The King of Thailand is considered the descendant of
Lord Vishnu. Much of the great Hindu epics, the Ramayana and Mahabharata, have
found their way into the art and religion of Thai Buddhism.

Bali is entirely Hindu. Angkor Wat, in nearby Cambodia, is
the world’s largest Hindu temple complex.
In the modern period Sikhs, Gujaratis and Tamils have been traders and
businessmen in Thailand since at least the late 19th century.

In the school I attended in India we had several boys of
Nepali and Sikh origin whose families had been settled in Thailand for generations.

I love these sorts of connections. Finding people in places
you don’t necessarily expect them. (Though as one Indian taxi driver in Sydney
told me a few years ago, ‘No matter where you go in the world, you’ll find
potatoes and Indians’, I shouldn’t keep being surprised.) Tonight, thanks to the blog monrakplengthai I am psyched about
sharing an amazing cassette. This is
music by a Thailand-born and bred Indian who sings in Thai but in the Bollywood
style. Here is the blurb about the music
from that blog.

A greatest hits of
Thai songs featuring Indian rhythms! This collection is full of great new
tunes from PhraiwanLukphet,
Phet Photaram and the star of the show, Sumit Satchathep! Sumit was born
to a family of Indian silk merchants in Bangkok's Bang Rak district. Although
his upbringing instilled in him an appreciation for the music of his mother
country, his surroundings influenced him as well, and at the height of the
brief 70's Luk Thung-Bollywood craze, the scene found its first bilingual
voice. Teaming with Chatri Sichon's former partner Yuphin Phraethong, Sumit
had a run of duet & solo hits in the late 70's. The first track here,
written by Surin Phaksiri, was his biggest single... most versions today have
clipped the flute intro because a skip in the master recording, but i decided
to leave it in. (http://monrakplengthai.blogspot.com.au/2011/10/phraiwan-lukphet-sao-ban-na-thi-na-rak.html)

This
is music that is wonderfully different, yet oh-so-familiar. I love the cover of the early 70’s hit Chal Chal Chal Mera Haathi sung half in
Thai and half in Hindi!